“You spend your whole life imagining ghosts, worrying about the pathway to the future, but all there will ever be is what’s happening here and the decisions we make in this moment, which are based in either love or fear. So many of us choose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. What we really want seems impossibly out of reach and ridiculous to expect, so we never dare ask the Universe for it. I’m saying I’m the proof you can ask the Universe for it.”

“My father could have been great comedian but he didn’t believe that was possible for him. And so he made a conservative choice; instead he got a safe job as an accountant, and when I was 12 years old he was let go from that safe job and our family had to do whatever we could to survive. I learned many great lessons from my father, not the least of which was that you can fail at what you don’t want – so you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.“

For a long time, I’ve been fervently anti e-reader. As far as I’m concerned, an unyielding piece of plastic just can’t compare to the wonder that is a bound book. I’m passionate about books; I love the way they feel in my hand, I love the way they smell, I love turning the pages and I love sitting in bookshops for hours, browsing and reading a little here and a little there, piling books up beside me and wishing I could take every single one home, and I love the process of deciding exactly which ones I’ll be buying this time round. (Inevitably, I take home more books than I think I should but far fewer books that I’d like to.) Continue reading →

After a few weeks of intense fun in Beijing, I am back in the depths of the English countryside. Strangely enough, it rained the whole time I was away and it is only now something resembling summer has finally reached England. I’m making the most of my country garden that catches the sunlight while I can; in three weeks, I’m moving to central London to live.

I’m currently sitting in my bedroom surrounded by piles of long-forgotten miscellany, such as tarot cards and almost empty bottles of perfume, with the occasional cardboard box teetering atop a heap of books pulled from the shelves and piled haphazardly on the floor or on top of something else. I have a distinct tendency to randomly throw things into boxes and then stash the boxes away out of sight, and on my journey through my wardrobe today I discovered old scraps of diary entries, neatly torn from school exercise books, mainly discussing boyfriends and horses; old love letters written to me by an enchanting boy I never met because he lived up North; a set of runes in a red velvet bag (when I pulled one out, it was the rune representing journeys); a set of plates and cups decorated with pictures of shoes that I have never used but intend to start using; and a lot more besides. I never throw things away. At university, my room was always awash with paper. Sometimes, when the urge came upon me, I’d pile all the paper into themed stacks – modern Chinese newspaper readings, notes from history lectures, photocopied short stories – but hardly ever filed it away properly, leaving it to gradually work its way across my floor and obscure the carpet until the urge to tidy returned. Unfortunately my room in the house I am moving into is significantly smaller then the room I am currently in, so I have to get rid of quite a lot. Including some books. I’m not especially impressed by this, but I’m only throwing away things like cheap classics that won’t cost a lot to repurchase and books I didn’t enjoy reading or have never read. The actual throwing out process is the hard part; after it is gone, whatever is it, I won’t miss it. This knowledge does not make it easier to part with anything.

It is goodbye from me until August – I’m off to China for the summer! I would blog while I’m out there, but none of my friends there can access my blog so I suspect it is banned. Maybe because I blogged about unpopular Chinese authors. Anyway, that means no more posts from me until I get back. I wish everyone a great summer, whatever you do and wherever you are. Enjoy yourselves!

Over the last few days my reading has focussed on acquiring new skills. In a geeky kinda way. As preparation for the new academic year (I’m getting in early, here) I decided the best thing I could do, besides the advance asignments I’ll be set, would be to improve my study skills. I discovered Tony Buzan; my local library has practically all his books as far as I can tell, and I’ve taken several out and have started on Speed Reading, which promises, among other things, to make students of the technique improve their reading speed, comprehension, the way they use their eyes and brains, their vocabulary and general knowledge and overall confidence. Who wouldn’t love all that? It had to come home with me. Also in the collection are books on improving my ‘perfect memory’, writing better essays and even one entitled ‘How to Argue and Win Evey Time’ – and I do so love arguing (but only when I win).

Contained in one of these books were some true life stories of people who had applied Buzan’s techniques and shot straight to the top of their classes with no other training. This got me thinking; is it really possible to increase one’s intelligence? The general consensus from the limited online research I’ve done seems to suggest it is possible. Various studies have demonstrated that certain factors can increase types of intelligence, from eating and exercising to listening to Mozart to simply expanding vocabulary from a few minutes’ study each day. Business people with an extensive vocabulary are supposedly more likely to succeed than their counterpart with weaker vocabularies, although this study is not substantiated. Doing crossword puzzles or sudoku are also credited with enhancing problem solving abilities and of course reading is the traditional method of becoming smarter. But do these methods actually result in tangible, long lasting mental benefits?

I’ve decided I’m going to give them a go and see. First up is the Speed Reading book, as I mentioned. Time is always an issue for students so using less of it to acomplish more seems like a sensible place to start. I’m also going to work on increasing my vocabulary every day and I might even buy a Sudoku book to try. The thing is, I remember feeling like I could do anything at all when I was 17. I was confident in myself and my intellectual abilities, and I have somehow never quite got that feeling back. I want to return to 17 year old me, ready to take on the world and know I can win. If reading books to help me build upon my existing skills can work towards bringing that about then that’s what I’ll do. Watch out Einstein, I’m coming!